Raised beds for vegetables

nuria.molina

Hello dear gardeners, 

I am very new to gardening and this year my partner and I had decided to grow some vegetables. 
We would like to have three raised beds. At the moment we have grass in our garden. 
Our problem is we are not sure what to put the raised bed on. As an example, I said to my partner to place the black liner to stop weeds across the whole vegetable area and then build the beds on the top. Then we could add some gravel around the beds. My partner thinks that we should put the gravel on the top of the liner an then placed the beds. 
Please, please, please, does anyone have a piece of advice about this dilemma??
Thank you so much. 

Nuria

Wilderbeast

You don't want to build beds over any plastic it will stop roots moving down and prevent drainage. If you are making raised beds then lay cardboard in the bottom (2or3 layers would be great) and then cover with your soil/ compost. 

Blue Onion

Second for cardboard over grass, works a treat.  Just make sure your beds are about 8 inches deep with soil.  Gravel around the edges is nice, and makes for less weeds creeping into the bed.  You can even put cardboard down covered in your weed fabric and then rocks.  It will quickly kill off all the grass below.  

nick615

nuria.molina   Is there a definite reason for choosing raised beds?  Would simply digging a patch of lawn achieve the same result?

nuria.molina

Thank you so much for your comments. 
@Wilderbeast, with black liner I meant the weed control fabric. So, do you still think I should not use it?
@nick615, we wanted raised bed because our soil is hard clay and it would be really hard to dig. Plus, I think we just love the look of raised bed 😊.

Wilderbeast

@nuria.molina you don't want or need a permanent membrane under the beds it will inhibit your vegetable growth and be a real pain to remove in the future. Weeds won't make it up through over 6 inch of compost/soil. Cardboard is really good at checking the growth of weeds with a thick layer of compost over the top 

nick615

@nuria.Molina  That's fine.  Never let anyone try to TELL you what to do, but I'm always afraid new gardeners may think they've got to have RB's and Polytunnels to be in fashion.  I'd have neither because of maintenance issues and ground wastage but, as long as you've made a conscious decision, enjoy them.

purplerallim

As I too have heavy clay soil @nuria.molina this is what I did with an old shed base area.
Cleared the area of grass/slabs/wood , built raised beds and placed them on the leveled ground, lined the wood but not the bottom of the beds, and then used the old slabs and some gravel to do the paths. This is the end result 

Hope this helps.

Wilderbeast

@purplerallim loving the black, we use black for all our wooden structures and fence

purplerallim

It makes it disappear into the background, unless you want the wood as a feature, it works well. Also shows off the plants doesn't it @Wilderbeast

Wilderbeast

Hope so @purplerallim as we have a 50mt long by 7ft high fence in black